The Thursday clap-tacular must now be put out of its misery!

Who is going to be the one to bring the peculiar spectacle of clapping at the sky every Thursday at 8 pm. To an end? Whoever they are, I sincerely hope they hurry up.

I had an uneasy feeling about it the very first time it happened. Why do I need to clap to show my gratitude, appreciation or whatever it is that I’m feeling? Isn’t it all a bit pointless when the people I’m clapping are probably at work doing something rather more useful than shaking spoons?

But I did it anyway. I worked in the NHS; I have family, friends and colleagues who are still doing so. I am proud of them. They give me hope despite my lack of faith in the institution and my dismay at its iconic status as something to be uncritically hero-worshipped.

Sadly, the clap turned out to be every bit as cultish and ghoulish as I expected. Predictably, every social media platform was awash with photos of people duly obliging and sharing it with the world: I clapped too!

It was every bit as self-serving a gesture as I feared. I resolved not to have anything to do with it again. And it seems, as I observe it each week from the safety of the great indoors, that more and more people are giving it a miss too.

Unfortunately, the clapping has turned into something progressively more sinister as the weeks have gone on. At first it was simply the shaming of people not taking part – we’ve all got used to shaming in lockdown Britain. But now, it is also being poisoned with the increasing nastiness of COVID politics.

IT seems that everyone now has an opinion on what you must think or feel if you are to be taking part in the applause without being a rancid hypocrite.

The signs, for me, were there when I received a foul stream of abuse on Twitter from an NHS nurse for politely remarking on the impact to other health conditions of the near-complete shutdown of anything that isn’t COVID-related, including trials, screening and treatment for cancer. It ended with the predictable demand to go and get private healthcare.

But that’s nothing! I’ve also been told that, if I choose to go out, I will have the blood of the NHS nurses treating me on my hands. Others have had ventilation wished upon them for daring to question the lockdown and the wisdom of this approach.

Much of this abuse doesn’t come from people in the NHS, but nor have any voices of condemnation been heard from the medical community. Indeed, the British Medical Association even joined the overtly political crusade of teaching unions before making a complete reversal of its position on schools a few days later when the contrast between their advice and the best available evidence was exposed.

I certainly don’t want to stand clapping alongside anyone who thinks this kind of treatment of other people and politicising of COVID-19 is anything other than an outrage.

Medical professionals have done their fair share of shaming over the weeks. There have been several news stories of nurses berating small gatherings of people not observing social distancing, involving the nurse confronting them whilst filming and later posting to social media. Of course, they could have simply shared the footage with the police, but that doesn’t come with anything like the notoriety or public canonisation by the clapping faithful.

Meanwhile, ministers are told not to dare clap given the PPE shortages, or as a result of various other failings that upset the policers of public discourse.

My side of the toxic lockdown divide hasn’t been much kinder about the clapping. There have, for instance, been criticisms of teachers, applauding carers whilst themselves kicking up a stink about returning to school. That criticism should, if fair, be applied to everyone who is unwilling to go back to work but quite content for key workers to risk their lives to keep us all cared for if sick, and living in a time of comfort and plenty when well.

That’s the ugly truth behind lockdown: it has been made manageable to its enthusiastic champions by others taking the risks that they don’t think they should have to. Little wonder then, that they don’t think it too much trouble to venture out once a week and bang a pan.

The clap has never been the heart-warming gesture of good will that it has been made out to be. It was a giant exercise in virtue signalling.

Now, it has been politicised too. IT needs to be brought to an end or it will become an increasingly pathetic, shrivelled joke. Maybe we can sing for supermarkets or tango for taxi drivers instead, if we need a new highlight of the week, but the Thursday clap-tacular must now be put out of its misery.